Winter Lights Festival hopes the ice holds

Winter Lights Festival producer Mike Carson is counting down not just days, but degrees.

JESSICA COHEN

Winter Lights Festival producer Mike Carson is counting down not just days, but degrees.

As the festival that opens Saturday, Jan. 26, approaches, Carson observes weather predictions, hoping they affirm projections that ice will stay frozen, skaters can skate and the show can go on with cold weather continuing.

"Last year we didn't have ice — we had water," Carson said of the unseasonably mild temperatures.

So far, so good — and he is charging ahead with plans for feature ice dance performances as well as "Ice Pops," shorter performances that provide breaks between longer ones. Based on Boston Pops short orchestral pieces, they include a series that will dramatize the progression of wars from the Middle Ages into the new millennium.

Carson is particularly dazzled by a giant puppet steed in chain mail whom a skater will dance into a Magna Carta-age battle to Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man."

"This year," said Carson, "the highlights are the "Ice Pops," three- to six-minute pieces that give people a break between long pieces."

After a Mac 'N' Cheese contest at the Dimmick Inn, 101 E. Harford St., from 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. Saturday, to which pros and amateurs are all welcome, Beth Woronoff's Boundless Edge Ice Dance Ensemble will open the skating performances at Ann Street Park with "Set Fire to the Ice," four young women ice dancing to music by Adele.

Also on the schedule for the afternoon, in addition to "War 1215-2014," will be "Berlin, 1928," set to "Threepenny Opera" dance music; "In Tonight's Performance," an ice comedy in which a celebrated ballerina performs with an impromptu replacement; "Love Where Art Thou," which is a tenuous love story; and "Blues at Birdland."

Announcement of the Mac 'N' Cheese contest winner will also be part of the afternoon, which will conclude with a 4:15 p.m. question-and-answer session with performers, along with free cookies and hot chocolate, at Good Shepherd Church Parish Hall, 110 W. Catharine St. Carson said he will tape the Good Shepherd Q&A for grant applications.

After performances conclude, all are welcome to skate on the ice, though not before, Carson said. And performances will resume on the next Saturday, Feb. 2, at 3 p.m. with Dance Theater of New York and local star skater Jordan Hartey.

The website winterlightsfest.com has schedule details and will provide updates.